Tomato paste should help, and you might add some grated sharp or extra sharp cheddar cheese. The vinegar trick works well but you'll probably want to use more tomato paste so it doesn't thin down too much. Haven't tried the coffee trick but it sounds interesting.

You didn't say what you use the sauce on; I make one sweet (two cans tomatoes, stick of butter... NOT oleo... 1/2 cup sugar, and vinegar, salt, and hot crushed red chilis to taste) to serve on collards and other greens. If you stew this for awhile it's great. With a little doctoring your sauce might adapt well to collards.

This is my first time ever making homemade tomato sauce. I used several tomatoes from our garden (very ripe) and dropped them in boiling water to peel them. I sauted onion and minced garlic in a pan, then added the tomatoes breaking them up while stirring. Basil, salt and 3 bay leaves were also added with 1 cup of water and 1 can of tomato paste. I added about 1 tbsp of sugar, my husband thought more was needed, and I added about the same amount of brown sugar. I thought more was needed and added light brown sugar (about 3 tbsp) because I ran out of dark brown sugar. Too sweet - this website said add red wine, I did a lot and it helped only a little.

My husband said not too bad - he'll eat it with the browned hamburger I will add to it.

My experience with tomato paste is that it's sweet in itself. Tomato sauce has lots of sodium, but if you check the back of the tomato paste can, it usually has very little sodium & more sugar. Tomatoes have natural sugar, so that makes sense. I would add tomato sauce before I would add tomato paste...but again, it all depends on what you've already put in there (what your recipe started with).

I use cans of tomato puree and crushed tomatoes. I found using the tuturosso brand instead of say cento, made a huge difference. My Italian grandmother also taught me to put a pinch of baking soda in. I don't like sweet gravy. Add that with the browned sausage (with it's drippings), some paste, and your good to go! Good Luck!

sweet wine, only smi sweet smi dry wine. My husband is Itilian, Use sweet basil next time you make sauce. Put some fresh tomatos or a can of stewed tomatos with out the the seasoning. / or try 1 small can of sauce and 1small paste, you may need to add a little more ITILAN season, organo and basil,and parsley. Bring to boil then simmer for 3hrs. good luck.

I use jar sauce all of the time, because it is quick and easy and my boyfriend wouldn't know the difference if it ht him over the head. I find it is always way too sweet. Tonight I got sick of sweet sauce and came on-line for a quick fix. Most people called for lemon juice or white vinegar. As I had neither in the house, I thought I would just have to suffer again. I looked in the fridge to see if there was anything, and lo and behold, I had a jar of kosher dills. Just one little teaspoon of the pickle juice in the sauce made it absolutely perfect!! I was afraid that even though it is mostly vinegar, the juice would make the sauce taste funny. It was great. The moral of this story is if all you have is pickle juice, go for it!